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how should we do shomen uchi using bokken? should we open our elbows like in this video of Morihiro Saito Sensei http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y1iXm89jI0 or should we form a triangle with our elbows and body so that the elbows are closer to each other and not to bend our elbows?

I know that different Sensei can have different bokken kata.. but shouldn't the basic stays the same? some people teaches the latter part which makes me wonder why it is different from the one being taught by Saito Sensei and all other references I found for that matter..

This is a good point raised, and not fully understood outside Iwama, These 2 videos he made in Italy of the Buki waza should only be used as guidance for where you place your feet and what the baiscs of each cut look like. The form in Morihiro Saitos should not be copied here as his body was in a a bad way. He had very damaged knees and back problems. There are better videos of Morihiros form out there, if your looking for traditional (Iwama) Aikido Hanmi and form look at his son, this is what his father taught him to look for and study.

This makes sense. I hear there are Aikidoka out there who spend years training with static wrist grabs before they work on anything flowing.

Dear Cliff,
Doing 'solid /go' 'waza is ok.Too many people do 'flowing /ju' waza too early.Its imo better to do both in a training session Some people even do Ki stuff without any solid or flexible training..Cheers, Joe

… most teachers in the lineage of Yamaguchi Sensei practise the
kesagiri cutting style (and a few teach more advanced katas) from Kashima Shinryu, rather than the "Aikiken" of Saito Sensei.

Interesting enough that Yamaguchi himself never really practiced KSR, as far as I know. As Tissier once wrote me, Yamaguchi was just so experienced with the sword that he just assimilated what was brought to the dojo by his students.

Which is ryu Yamaguchi sensei practiced in his youth. And which maybe has been the basis of his swordwork?

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I wonder whether your liking for TSKSR is precisely because it is in a fundamental way separate from aikido –

Well, you are right insofar as TSKSR and aikido don’t share movements or techniques or something like that.
But the connection of both is even elder then aiki ken. Aikido and TSKSR have strong and old connection at the Sugino dojo. There where people doing both: Katori and aikido long befor aiki ken was born.
So both are fundamental separated but closely connected.

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it wasn't developed in order to inform a particular way of doing aikido technique

Isn’t this also true for “original” KSR?
I’m not sure about the swordwork of Inaba sensei? I think there may have been interaction with the aikido he practiced with Yamaguchi sensei. Tissier to my knowledge sometimes talks about how this swordwork affected his (Tissier’s) aikido.

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I would be interested in your thoughts - do you find there are any movements in TSKSR which you feel are incompatible for any reason with the way you understand aikido?

I don’t know enough about Katori to give a competent answer.
Well: Sugino Yoshio and Sugino Yukihiro practice(d) both arts on a high level. Also my teacher does both. Mochizuki integrated both into his Yoseikan budo. There are a whole lot of people who’s names I don’t know, who are happy, doing both arts. And there are the people around me, who practice both arts. It seems to work?

As I said above: What attracts most Is not the waza, not the outer form. But the way they us the “tools”: Body, movement, ki, … things like that.
Few weeks ago my teacher told me about a seminar when Endo sensei asked: "Did you watch me? What did you see? ..." Later in the evening my teacher said to sensei: "You moved your foot." Sensei was happy: "You really saw that?" It's just things like that.

ah and about kesa giri: Endo talks a lot about differentiating kesa giri and yokomen uchi. The suburi Endo does, as far as I feel it is different from the kesa giri Tissier teaches ... ?!
And when practicing sword we do different forms of yokomen uchi.

Interesting enough that Yamaguchi himself never really practiced KSR, as far as I know. As Tissier once wrote me, Yamaguchi was just so experienced with the sword that he just assimilated what was brought to the dojo by his students.

I had never seen Yamaguchi show any swordwork apart from basic shomen-uchi and nihogiri until I saw William Gleason's "Aikido and Japanese Sword" DVD, where there is a fascinating bit of film of him demonstrating some partner practice that looks - in its style, at least - very much like the ura-dachi of KSR.

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I'm not sure about the swordwork of Inaba sensei? I think there may have been interaction with the aikido he practiced with Yamaguchi sensei. Tissier to my knowledge sometimes talks about how this swordwork affected his (Tissier's) aikido.

As I understand it, Inaba was the original source of the KSR influence on aikido, although I think Noguchi Sensei also studied at the KSR (and was one of Sekiya Sensei's teachers). He spent some time studying with Kunii, the then head of KSR, although the KSR these days tend to claim that Inaba missed the point and didn't really understand what he had learnt from Kunii. It would be interesting to speculate how much of the KSR Yamaguchi picked up from Inaba, and how much he worked out for himself...

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ah and about kesa giri: Endo talks a lot about differentiating kesa giri and yokomen uchi. The suburi Endo does, as far as I feel it is different from the kesa giri Tissier teaches ... ?!
And when practicing sword we do different forms of yokomen uchi.

That is very interesting - Endo hasn't shown much swordwork in any of the classes of his that I have been in. I would love to see him teaching sword, but as far as I know he has no plans to come to the UK...

I think Endo Sensei is another teacher who absorbs things from others and then over time makes them thoroughly his own. Although he publicly states that Yamaguchi Sensei (as well as O-Sensei, of course) was his main teacher, his aikido certainly doesn't look like a copy.

As I understand it, Inaba was the original source of the KSR influence on aikido, although I think Noguchi Sensei also studied at the KSR (and was one of Sekiya Sensei's teachers). He spent some time studying with Kunii, the then head of KSR, although the KSR these days tend to claim that Inaba missed the point and didn't really understand what he had learnt from Kunii. It would be interesting to speculate how much of the KSR Yamaguchi picked up from Inaba, and how much he worked out for himself...

If one tries to teach Aikido and KSR techniques at the same time one will NOT (cannot) perform the KSR techniques correctly (in so far as "correctness" is defined by members of KSR). The sword techniques and kata taught might share some similarities to KSR, but the key elements (i.e., the very elements that give KSR its unique identity) will either be corrupted or missing altogether. At that point, they no longer are KSR techniques.

Off course, the "correctness" is defined by members of Aikido is much more fluid

As I understand it, Inaba was the original source of the KSR influence on aikido, ...

Yes. But he was already studying with Yamaguchi sensei: "I joined him privately as a student and I studied his movements and ideas. Then my mind and body were ready and I joined Kunii Sensei." (Aikido Journal #120) That's why I think that his view of KSR was affected of what he had learned from Yamaguchi sensei.

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That is very interesting - Endo hasn't shown much swordwork in any of the classes of his that I have been in. I would love to see him teaching sword, but as far as I know he has no plans to come to the UK...

I'm sorry: I never saw sensei using a sword. I talked about the tai jutsu suburi he teaches almost everytimes.

The KSR dojo in Frankfurt / Main (which is in Germany) officially doesn't allow people who practice aikido to join the dojo. You have to assure to have stopped doing aikido before you are allowed to start practicing KSR.

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Off course, the "correctness" is defined by members of Aikido is much more fluid

As far as I know, this is about the unerstanding of sen no sen, kiri otoshi, and some other issues. And about the internal work of KSR.
Interesting for me: Tissier sensei mentions nearly the same points, when explaining what the swordwork of Inaba gave his aikido.

One of the things Karl Friday is saying (paraphrasing slightly) is that if you mix some bits of Aikido into Kashima Shinryu the result is no longer Kashima Shinryu. Do you have a criteria for the opposite, i.e: "if you mix some bits of Kashima Shinryu into Aikido, it is no longer Aikido" ?

One of the things Karl Friday is saying (paraphrasing slightly) is that if you mix some bits of Aikido into Kashima Shinryu the result is no longer Kashima Shinryu. Do you have a criteria for the opposite, i.e: "if you mix some bits of Kashima Shinryu into Aikido, it is no longer Aikido" ?

I think the point is more that it is impossible to "mix some bits of Aikido into Kashima Shinryu." Kashima Shinryu is exactly one thing: a transmission of principals using a very specific structure and progression of training methodology, from the founder through licensed instructors to the students they choose to take on and teach.

It isn't that "mixing bits" of Aikido somehow spoils the "brew." it is that there is simply no part of Kashima Shinryu training where a student goes "what if I move like this instead of what I am supposed to do in the kata?" That's just not part of the program. And it would be pointless, because you would be trying to bypass learning something you are supposed to be learning. You are off the kata such that you are not priming yourself to understand a gokui. My take on it, anyway.

The reverse would be fine in most styles of Aikido training IMO. I'm not sure whether to characterize Iwama and Yoshinkan training methods as kata- and gokui-based in a similar way to koryu. If training involves doing certain things as a means to elicit a certain quality of movement or sensitivity in the practitioner, as opposed to obtaining a certain result, I wouldn't mess with it.

As far as I was told, the main difference is the "spirit" of fighting. I was told that you can not develop the "true spirit" of KSR when practicing aikido. (Interestingly Tissier often talks about the spirit of the swordwork, derived from KSR by Inaba sensei, being exactly the thing that interested him so much.)
And that you can not reach a true undestanding of the philosophy or esoteric teaching of KSR.

I can't imagine that an aikidoka who enters a koryu thinks about changing the tradition of that koryu?
"what if I move like this instead of what I am supposed to do in the kata?" is simply not imaginable, isn't it? Not when doint KSR. Not when doing TSKSR. Not when doing any other koryu budo.

And I don't think that this is the point: Through my discussions with German members of the KSR I learned, that the decision of not allowing aikidoka to enter the ryu has very deep contentual reasons. They truely think that someone who practices aikido has made decisions - in his mind and his body - which don't allow him to use body and mind to do what has to be done or to think was has to be thought when doing KSR.

With regard to the understanding of kata in aikido: As far as I am concerned I learned an learn aikido through practicing kihon no kata. Precise movements, static in the most basic form, bearing the same feeling like doing kata in kenjutsu.
I can't imagine how it is possible to "elicit a certain quality of movement or sensitivity in the practitioner" if not by doing the precise kata over and over again.

I believe that Inaba sensei has relatively recently decided to use Kashima no Tachi as the name for what he learnt during his 1.5 years with Kunii sensei, and his subsequent studies.

When I asked him why he continued to teach Aikido taijutsu along with kenjutsu, he told me that he finds it is important for developing yawarami (soft body) - which aids kenjutsu. Of course in my experience there are more than a few shihan and senior aikidoka (of a variety of lineages) who don't exactly feel very soft

I believe that Inaba sensei has relatively recently decided to use Kashima no Tachi as the name for what he learnt during his 1.5 years with Kunii sensei, and his subsequent studies.

When I asked him why he continued to teach Aikido taijutsu along with kenjutsu, he told me that he finds it is important for developing yawarami (soft body) - which aids kenjutsu. Of course in my experience there are more than a few shihan and senior aikidoka (of a variety of lineages) who don't exactly feel very soft

Its an interesting reversal of ratios where, if I understood correctly, a "bit" of Aikido added informs his KSR based kenjitsu.

Its an interesting reversal of ratios where, if I understood correctly, a "bit" of Aikido added informs his KSR based kenjitsu.

Like many things - I think it's a little more complicated than that

Aikido is a broad church - many different styles, many different connections through to Hombu, different personal contacts and relationships etc. Lucky for us - there are all sorts of different teachers and styles to go to and learn from - who appeals to us personally, by their technique, by their effectiveness, by their spirituality or by their character or some combination!

Aikido is a broad church - many different styles, many different connections through to Hombu, different personal contacts and relationships etc. Lucky for us - there are all sorts of different teachers and styles to go to and learn from - who appeals to us personally, by their technique, by their effectiveness, by their spirituality or by their character or some combination!

Just FYI, this view does not seem to be shared by the entire Aikido community.

And I don't think that this is the point: Through my discussions with German members of the KSR I learned, that the decision of not allowing aikidoka to enter the ryu has very deep contentual reasons. They truely think that someone who practices aikido has made decisions - in his mind and his body - which don't allow him to use body and mind to do what has to be done or to think was has to be thought when doing KSR.

I don't buy it. It seems much more likely that the lion's share of unsuitable candidates their instructor gets knocking on his door are Aikidoka and want to train in the source of Tissier's sword, so he's come up with a blanket excuse for a default "no."

I could see requiring new students to drop all other arts entirely because you have to start with a clean slate, or even requiring that new students have an established skill-set of some kind or else they are required to cross-train in something specific.

Given how diverse Aikido styles are in their training and emphasis, it really seems like there is something else going on if the prohibition is particularly against Aikidoka.

I don't buy it. It seems much more likely that the lion's share of unsuitable candidates their instructor gets knocking on his door are Aikidoka and want to train in the source of Tissier's sword,

I'm sorry, but: Nope, don't hink so.

One of the two German aikikai affiliated federations is lead by Tissier and Endo. (This is the one I belong to.) So Tissier's aikido and swordwork is well represented in Germany. Lot of dojo, lot of seminars. All over the country, all over the year. Also Inaba himself is teaching in Germany. And there are even dojo, where his swordwork is taught independently of aikido.
So, there is a very good infrastructure and publicity, a lot of dojo, where you can find Tissier's sword. And in Frankfurt Tissier is very well represented for over twenty years now. It was one point in Germany where Tissier's (and also Endo's) way in Germany started long long ago. (When I began to practice about 18 year ago, it already had spread out into the whole country.)

I just try to tell you, that it is clearly not such "organisational" issues which cause the mentionede prohibition and the - in Germany well known - conflicts between KSR and aikido.
Someone who knows who Tissier is and who wants to learn his swordwork will "never" end up asking at the KSR shibu. He won't even find it without help.

Some years ago I had long and interesting conversations with a member (not the one holding the menkyo kaiden) of the German shibu of the KSR. And it became very clear, that the ban of aikidoka in the KSR shibu is founded in the teachings of the ryu. It seems to become evident when you practice long enough to understand what Frieday calls "the kabbala" of the ryu: The inner teachings, the "ura" doctrine.
Whether it is true that there is such a deep gap between the inner teachings of KSR and aikido I am not able to judge.

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I could see requiring new students to drop all other arts entirely ...
...the prohibition is particularly against Aikidoka.

There exist, as far as I know, only three European shibu of the KSR. In 2008/9 when I was in contact with the shibu in Frankfurt/Germany they indeed required to drop all other arts entirely: No aikido, no kendo, no other koryu budo, even no boxing or tai chi.
Maybe things have changed since then concerning other arts. But aikido is still excluded.

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... it really seems like there is something else going on ...

Yes, I think this indeed is true nevertheless.
A complicated, all too human story maybe ...

There exist, as far as I know, only three European shibu of the KSR. In 2008/9 when I was in contact with the shibu in Frankfurt/Germany they indeed required to drop all other arts entirely: No aikido, no kendo, no other koryu budo, even no boxing or tai chi.
Maybe things have changed since then conerning other arts. aikido is still excluded.

Yes, I think this indeed is true nevertheless.
A complicated, all too human story maybe ...

Some years ago when I was in Japan I was given an intro to the KSR group practicing at Tokyo University and went along on a Saturday to see if I could train. By chance Seki sensei (KSR Shihanke) was in town, and obviously he took the class. When I asked if I could train, he immediately asked if I was Tanaka sensei's student and I replied that I was Inaba sensei's student. He then said that he had had some other people come asking to train, and he had sent them away to get permission from Tanaka/Inaba (and they hadn't come back). When I mentioned that I had already discussed this with Inaba sensei who had no problems with people training elsewhere, he thought for a moment and then said that if I took the responsibility, he would allow me to join the class. I enjoyed it, and we had a beer and nibbles afterwards - very friendly group. I was given permission to return the following week "but only for kihondachi". Unfortunately that was the week I had a kidney stone (high summer and not hydrating enough while practicing - watch out!) so I was unable to

Moral of the story perhaps is that life can be easier if you talk to the head guy On a related note, I have had a very pleasant lunch with Karl Friday on a different trip to Tokyo.

I would be happy to train again (but not if I had to renounce all other arts etc...)